Change of title
Since it wasn’t quite the smash Square Enix was hoping I’ve never really understood why Lara Croft wasn’t made to star in other kinds of games. I don’t mean like a driving game spin-off or something but a lot of the early games were billed as ‘Lara Croft in Tomb Raider’, so why not have Lara Croft in something else?

That seems to me an obvious way to avoid upsetting fans and they could put here in a straight shooter or a survival horror game and it wouldn’t seem like a con. I enjoyed the reboot but it really wasn’t a Tomb Raider game no matter what it pretended or was called.

Lara doesn’t have to just be in action games either, there could even be a 100 per cent puzzle game or maybe some sort of Walking Dead style adventure game. Just as long as they don’t get the same person to write the dialogue as for the last game. Your crew of shipmates were just pathetic.Futterman

Funny game
Want to add another vote in favour of Rogue Legacy which really is fantastic and wonderfully imaginative and… funny. I know indie games have to compensate with other things because the graphics aren’t so good but one of the things I always like about them is that they rarely take themselves too seriously. There’s no stupid dudebro story or trying to be a movie, it’s just a little computer guy up and against the odds and who cares if it makes sense.

And when they are serious (I’m think the survival horrors in particular) there’s a willingness to do a slow burn that most retail games would never touch (one of the reason The Last Of Us works so well I think).

Basically all triple-A games have to be Michael Bay films but indie games can be whatever they want, and that’s why I think they’re only going to get more important and popular in the next gen.Gannet

Side issue
Bit of a coincidence Friday’s news story about a new Strider game. Over the last few days I’ve been obsessing over a game I used to play in my local arcade, ‘The Cueball’ in the mid 80s – often when I should have been in school. After a lot of messing about with Google it turns out the game I was thinking of was also by Capcom.

It was called Hyper Dyne Side Arms, it was a two-player co-op side-scrolling shooter of the mech suit variety with some pretty awesome weapons and a clever power-up mechanic. I’d much prefer to see a HD remake of this game over Strider but that’s just personal taste and I did like Strider as well.

When you think about it, Capcom have a huge catalogue of old arcade games that could be resurrected for HD consoles.mitchell
PS: I also have fond memories of Rygar, although I don’t remember seeing the PlayStation 2 remake. Was it any good?

GC: It was a reboot rather than a remake, as is Strider, and we quite liked it at the time. Although it’s impossible not to describe it as a poor man’s God Of War, even though it came out first. The Mobilsuits from Side Arms are featured in some of Devilotte’s attacks in the recent Project X Zone, so Capcom haven’t completely forgotten about it.

Virtual worth
Great to see your review of Shantae, I’ve always wondered what that game was like and of course been unwilling to spend the hundreds of pounds to find out. With EarthBound coming out now as well though it does make me wonder whether video games will ever really be worth anything as antiques in the future. The consoles themselves will be I guess but the cartridges are going to become almost worthless at this rate, unless they’re in super mint condition or something.

It seems a little sad to me that the physical manifestation of my hobby will literally become worthless in the future, especially modern games which simply won’t work without an Internet connection (an irony given how expensive some of them are with their collector’s editions).

I guess it doesn’t really matter, but like wanting to have a shelf full of games to look at and admire, I also like to pretend to myself that some can be rare or extra valuable.Brute Wayne

Police action
I’m a bit hesitant to promote any new Kickstarter campaigns, especially after your scathing Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded review, but I think some people might find this one for Precinct interesting. It’s basically a spiritual sequel to the old Police Quest games by the same guy, which started off as the same sort of games as Leisure Suit Larry and then sort of morphed into the SWAT series (which is also dead now, I assume).

I have to admit I used to like them, although I’ve always resisted going back to them in case they’re not what I remember. But what this makes you realise is how few games there are where you actually play a cop in anything like a realistic scenario. That sort of thing happens all the time with movies and TV but it’s very rare with games and I’m not sure why. It’s not like there wouldn’t be enough action if it was set in America.

So I hope this game gets made, even though I’m still debating whether to actually join the Kickstarter or not.84Colbat

Price of exclusivity
Given the response to the Xbox One I can’t help wondering what’s going to happen to all these games that are supposed to be format exclusives. I imagine EA must be thinking they’ve backed the wrong horse in particular with Titanfall and I wonder how long it’ll be before we hear of a PlayStation 4 version for that.

But what about games like Dead Rising 3, which I think Microsoft implied it funded? If Capcom worry it’s not going to sell is there anything they can do? Has it ever been confirmed exactly how much Microsoft paid for it to be an exclusive, or how much that sort of thing usually costs?

What worries me more is smaller games like D4 and Insomniac’s new game. I assume Microsoft must have paid money for those too, or otherwise incentivised them. But if they don’t sell because the Xbox One doesn’t sell I’m worried that could be it for these companies. You don’t get this trouble on the PC you know…BeeBeeQ

GC: As you might imagine that sort of thing is never discussed in public. Capcom has spoken about Microsoft helping with the development of Dead Rising 3, which implies financial help, but how much and under what conditions is never made clear.

Continuing the trend
The writer of the abysmal Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li has been given the gig of scripting the Dead Space movie.

This is precisely why there are no good movies based in games. Because nobody puts any effort into developing them. Hiring a writer simply because he wrote another movie based on a computer game, regardless of its quality or content, is a blatant example of letting the men in suits make the creative decisions.

And why make a Dead Space movie anyway? It is simply a mash-up of various sci-fi films already out there. That’s its point, like most games out there it tries to recreate bits out if various films of a certain genre. Just like Red Dead or Grand Theft Auto.

Make a movie based on a game with an original premise or style and hire a talented team of creative people to put it together.

The film industry produces tons of great films, both big and small, when it lets the right people do the right job. In my mind it’s just been a spiral of bad luck leading to a bad rep that has caused video game movies to be confined to the gutters of cinema.@PjDonnelli

Non-interactive advertising
Is it just me or are adverts for Dynasty Warriors 8 everywhere at the moment? I even get them on Metro, which doesn’t usually have game ads. Why on earth would you spend money advertising a super niche game like that? What is any causal gamer going to think of when they see it? ‘It’s on number eight so it must be good?’ Aren’t they going to feel a bit weird that they’ve never heard of it until now and then when they google its scores they find out everyone hates it?

I guess I just don’t understand marketing in general but wouldn’t like… a demo or something help more? Why should anyone be interested in a game just because of a static picture of some Chinese guy? Well, I’m not but I am interested to know if GC will review it. It’s always a laugh hearing form the country’s three fans defend it and pretend it’s really a 9/10.Punchy

GC: As usual we weren’t sent the game, but we’ll try and have a review ready for this week.

Inbox also-rans
Am I the only one that’s never even heard of the DuckTales game before? If Americans think it’s an all-time classic, why has it never been mentioned until now?Purple Ranger

This may be a silly question (it’s definitely a rhetorical one) but why are Nintendo pinning so many hopes on Pikmin 3 when the last two games have already proven it’s not that big a seller?Mr Rusty

This week’s Hot Topic
The topic for this weekend’s Inbox was suggested by reader TheRunawayTrain, who asks what’s your most fondly remembered social gaming experience?

What multiplayer moment do you recall most fondly and was it competitive or co-operative, online or offline? Who were you playing with and were they casual gamers or more hardcore fans? Have you found it easy to repeat the experience or did it turn out to be more of a one-off? Did you know the people involved beforehand and was it hard to convince them to play?

Generally speaking how often do you player multiplayer compared to single-player and which do you prefer: competitive or co-op? Does it matter to you whether your opponent/ally is in the same room or do you think online multiplayer is just as good as offline?